


The Kore System

by Arya_Greenleaf



Series: Twitter Fic [18]
Category: Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015)
Genre: Alternate Universe - Gender Changes, Alternate Universe - Modern Setting, Bathtubs, Domestic Fluff, Dry Humping, F/F, Kissing
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2019-03-05
Updated: 2019-03-05
Packaged: 2019-11-12 05:30:31
Rating: Explicit
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 5,884
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/18004733
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Arya_Greenleaf/pseuds/Arya_Greenleaf
Summary: Hux comes home exhausted after a marathon at the observatory where she may have made a major discovery. Kylo has ideas other than sleeping, wired from spending the time that Hux has been away deep into the world of her own work.





	The Kore System

**Author's Note:**

> Click for stunning paintings of Kylo by the wonderful [hedge](https://mobile.twitter.com/st_hedge/status/1104124918428549120) and [youdidnotseeme ](https://mobile.twitter.com/ydnsm1/status/1109501460067213312)

Hux is dead on her feet. She doesn't even remember getting in the car and yet here she is, sitting in the driveway. It worries her.

She'd been up all night trying to coordinate with the observatory's sister campuses abroad. There was a mountain of new data to push through. They were trying to pinpoint the center of a solar system a handful of parsecs away.

The aim was to figure out if it was even a solar system at all. The poorly resolved images they'd put together so far indicated it might just be a twin to their own. The parallax was proving difficult to deal with.

Hux hasn't slept in twenty-four? Forty-eight hours?

She refuses to pass the data off to someone else on the team. She was the first to propose the idea that they might actually be looking at a system similar to their own and she'll be damned somone else is going to get the lion's share of the credit for it if she's right.

Hux drags herself out of the car. She puts the emergency break on even though it's not really necessary. Her brain fog is making her feel overly cautious. She stumbles up the steps of the front porch, smacking her shin at the top, forgetful of how many steps there are.

Her keys refuse to go in the fucking door. She can picture Kylo inside, watching and listening to Hux struggle, not bothering to get up off of the couch and help.

It's cold out, twenty-below with the wind. Hux will not admit to having tried the top lock with the bottom key and vice-versa. She will die with the claim that the lock was simply frozen.

The house is quiet when she finally gets inside. Almost too quiet, she thinks. When Hux last got an "Are you alive?" text from Kylo, she had said that she was working -- plowing through a piece that would _make the Poetry Society eat crow_ , in her own words.

Hux expects the house to be full of Kylo's cohorts. At the very least, her mother -- perhaps her sister. Kylo keeps her work close and quiet but when something is big she craves feedback. It's strange that no one would be here sitting through a live performance and listening to Kylo over-analyze every linguistic and structural choice.

What strikes Hux as _truly_ odd is the state of the windows. Kylo generally prefers them shuttered. Even in the summer, though the heavy curtains are replaced by lighter ones, they are covered and the rooms are shadowy.

Now, it seems that every curtain has been thrown open to let the light in. For the first time, Hux realizes that the walls are actually a dusty blue -- not grey.

Hux drops her bag on the floor and strips out of her coat and gloves and thick knitted hat. "Kylo?" She calls into the house.

The kitchen is quiet, the instruments of breakfast in the sink. The kettle is long since cold.

Hux makes her way up the stairs and finds more open curtains on the landing. The sun pours through the open door of Kylo's bedroom. The ladder to the attic is still pulled down -- the portal to Kylo's private world hanging open, mysterious and inviting.

Kylo isn't there, though. Hux is drawn instead by the steam that curls down the hall from the ajar bathroom door.

It carries a bright, heady perfume through the air. Hux steps through the low-hanging tendril, vapor condensing and clinging to her boots. "Kylo?"

The scent is much stronger when Hux steps into the bathroom. It seems that all of the warmth that should be out in the world has been bottled up and kept in this room for Kylo's sole use. Everything is covered in a layer of heavy condensation that makes all the reflective surfaces blurry and dull.

Hux is dizzy with the scent of oranges and coconut and some somber floral base she cant quite identify. Her heart flutters when she turns toward the tub.

It's a massive thing on clawed feet. The contractor had had to gut the room to make space for it when Kylo rampaged through the place armed with her publisher's advance.

Kylo is in the tub, perfectly still and silent. All that's visible of her is the top of her head, the waterline concealing everything right to the bow of her lips. The water itself is unnatural. The bone white tub makes the deep, bright red of the water look almost obscene. The surface shimmers with swirls gold, freckled with broken petals.

Kylo's eyes are closed and she breathes in wide, slow breaths that make the water ripple. The ripples tease the soaked tendrils of her hair, curled around her in a dark stain against the water.

"Kylo," Hux says firmly and it is like shes's woken some ancient creature from slumber.

Kylo's eyes flick open suddenly. The chocolate of them appears like burnished amber, the sunshine streaming through the sky light reflecting off the swirls of gold and catching against her irises. She rises slowly from the water, just to the base of her throat. Her hair sticks to her neck and cheeks. The humidity weighs it down, makes her ears more prominent.

"Have you found us a galaxy far, far away?"

Hux frowns, "Who said you were invited?"  
  
"I meant the collective, I suppose. Humanity. We'll either have to fuck off this mortal coil or find a new planet soon." Hux snorts and Kylo sinks back down into the water again, covering her chin. "I almost called again, but I thought better of it. You were so annoyed the last time."

The water churns softly and her knees emerge like little islands in the red ocean. It could be the surface of the new Earth Hux is hunting down. A fantastic water-world just the right distance from her sun.

Kylo's fingers appear and she skims the water, making the gold swirl violently. "I was thinking about sending you something to eat."

"Here in the bathroom where there's not a single delivery menu or phone or laptop in sight?"

"Mm."

"How thoughtful."

"The most."  
  
"I have to piss, do you mind?"

Kylo sinks a little further down, her face disappearing behind the tall side of the tub as if to give Hux privacy.

Sitting down is a terrible idea. Once she does she has a difficult time getting back up, her knees absolutely _fucked_ from being up and about with no rest, her boots not made for such long wear. Not to mention the fact that her eyes begin to droop -- that is the last thing Hux needs. She can picture it perfectly in her mind, vivid with lack of sleep, concussed after passing out right off the toilet.

Her face looks puffy and dry even in the distorted reflection of the steam-covered mirror.

"Did you finish writing for the day?" Hux asks while she dries her hands. Her mouth feels like its full of cotton.

She listens to Kylo explain how she's outlined the structure of the piece and decided where it will fit in narrative of her book over the sound of her toothbrush scrubbing diligently over her teeth. Hux wipes her mouth and crosses over to the tub. She perches carefully on the edge, still listening. "And how is this going to get the Poetry Society's attention?"

"I'm angling for the _Four Quartets_. It's for sequential work. This piece... this one will effectively link _all_ of my previous work to the new book -- all of the work they fucking snubbed. But I think it'll also just grab enough attention for this book on its own." Kylo makes a terrible, dark expression. "A sequence of sequences -- complete -- _comprehensive_." Color rises in her already heat-flushed cheeks. "We'll throw a big celebration. I'll have the _Quartets_ \-- you'll have your new galaxy."

"Solar system, sweet."

"Is there a fucking difference?"

Prickly ire fills Hux's chest. "There is a _significant_ fucking difference."

Kylo raises a brow, a growly rumble coming out of her throat. "There's my Sun." She flicks her fingers and Hux jerks away from the splash of water.

"What the hell are you stewing in?"

"Blood and milk." Kylo responds soberly. She stretches luxuriantly. Her pointed toes emerge to rest against the end of the tub. She reaches up over her head with long, pale arms -- shattered petals cling to her skin, tinted water sticking like a film.

"You've watched too many shitty horror flicks, Kylo. Stick to your Shelley."

Kylo rolls her eyes. "That's the name of the bath thing, you insufferable snob."

Hux pushes the retort on her tongue back behind her teeth. It would be too easy. Kylo jerks her thumb over her shoulder in the general direction of the sideboard. Sure enough, the torn paper packet sitting on top says _blood and milk._

"Blood orange and coconut milk," Hux reads when she rises to fetch it. "With biodegradable glitter and essential oils." Hux balls the paper up and pitches it into the trash. "I'm going to eat something and go to bed."

"Wait," Kylo says, sitting up and twisting around to better face Hux.

Hux has to look at the floor. Kylo is too much like this -- wet and shimmering and warm, contradictory and rude.

"You've been away _so_ long -- and it's only ten in the morning. You'll ruin your clock."

"My clock is already ruined. I'm exhausted."  
Hux sits back down on the edge of the tub.

Kylo looks like a siren straight out of a deep sea cave the way she's poised in the tub, body twisted into an alluring _S._ "You've been gone so long, I think I've forgotten what you taste like."

Hux rolls her eyes and leans in. She graces Kylo with the lightest peck. Kylo's wet hand comes down on Hux's thigh where it's propped on the tub.

"And how you feel," Kylo sighs, her brow crinkling with a look of despair. She rises just inches more out of the water, arching her back toward Hux. The soft white of her breast shimmers with gold -- and essential oils, Hux supposes. "And what it's like to have your hands on me."

She picks Hux's hand up from where it rests on the bath-warmed porcelain and brings it to her lips. She opens her mouth to let Hux's fingers rest on her tongue. Her plush lip tugs down as she drags Hux's hand down over her chin.

Hux has to lean in and brace herself on the far edge of the tub.

Kylo touches herself softly with Hux's fingers, tracing the line of her throat and the curve of her breast. She cranes her neck forward, mouth open and expectant.

Hux has the tremendous urge to spit, to watch it pool on Kylo's tongue. Kylo would swallow it, Hux knows. She'd do it with relish just to please Hux. She rids herself of the notion with a little shake of her head and gives Kylo the indulgent kiss she's expecting.

The whole thing is getting to Hux. The heat and the scent of the bath -- now the softness of Kylo's mouth. Hux feels woozy with it all, everything piling on top of her exhaustion to make her feel silly and loose -- drunk-like.

Hux almost doesn't register the way Kylo's fingers fist into the front of her shirt. She almost doesn't notice how Kylo tugs, sharp and sudden.

Hux feels herself pitching forward like it's happening in slow motion. Her boot slips on the vapor-wet tile, rubber sole squealing against ceramic, and then she's falling.

Shes's suddenly warm and wet, her head completely full of the scent of _blood and milk._ There is water everywhere. It sloshes over the edges of the tub and smacks Hux in the face in a fragrant, tinted wave.

"Fuck!" She slurs through a moutful of it. "Kylo!"

Hux is soaked to the bone and Kylo is laughing -- _laughing_!

"Hux, your face!" Kylo wheezes and pulls Hux close enough to kiss.

Hux struggles to sit up, slipping and sliding against the tub and Kylo. The edges are too wet to hold onto, her boots slide against the bottom. " _Why_ \-- you fucking -- "

"You're wound so goddamned tight your springs are gonna pop."  
  
" _You_ \-- I -- " Hux's mind is a mess. Imaging data, exhaustion, hunger, and now outrage all vying to get their hands on the wheel of her operating system. "Fucking brat!" She finally screeches.

Hux gets her hands on Kylo's shoulders, knees finally braced, and pushes. Kylo's eyes grow very wide very fast and she squeezes them shut just before she disappears beneath the water.

She resurfaces after a moment, hair stuck to her face like a B-horror monster. "Do you feel better now?"

Hux huffs and sits back, Kylo's knees an easy seat. "Absolutely not," she insists and brushes the damp clump of her own hair away from her brow.

Kylo dunks herself again and tips her head back as she rises to move her creeping, inky hair. She reaches out and picks a petal off of Hux's face, flicks it into the water.

Hux starts to hoist herself up and Kylo grabs her by the waist, keeping her hovering in the glimmering pool with her fingers curled tightly around the edges. "Stay."

"My clothes -- "

"Will dry. And this stuff doesn't stain. All you wear is black anyway."

"My shoes -- "

"Are wrecked already. I'll buy you new ones."

"This is ridiculous," Hux hisses even as she allows herself to be manhandled. 

They shift around until Hux is situated between Kylo's long legs, bracketed by her knees. She wraps her arms around Hux's torso, stroking her sides under the water, luring Hux down to rest against her body.

"Fucking _ludicrous_. You're fucking -- "  
  
"Mhm. Yes, all of those things." Kylo puts a dripping hand up and lays her fingers against Hux's lips. "Just relax."

"I'm fully dressed in the goddamned bathtub how am I supposed to relax?"

"Figure it out."

Hux stops resisting. She lets her body unlock, feels herself soften against Kylo. It's not terrible. Foolish, completely insane. But not terrible.

She's happy that her cell phone is still in her bag downstairs and not in her pants pocket.

Kylo's big hands grip her waist entirely ungently after a few long moments. She kneads the muscles of Hux's sides and digs her thumbs into the tight knots at the small of her back.

"She is the core," Kylo whispers. Her voice seems syrupy, heavy in the humidity of the bathroom. "She is elemental fusion, radiating and explanding. The photosphere veil of her skin -- her teeth -- her hair -- draws me into prayer."

Hux realizes she's been dozing. She's not sure how long Kylo has been murmuring in her ear. "I hate that poem."

"Uhuh." Kylo presses harder and something pops. Sweet, sudden relief washes through Hux's system and she shudders. "Mm," Kylo croons. "There she is."

"This is absurd," Hux counters with a tremble.

"You've already used that excuse."

Kylo's hands move and heer body curls around Hux. She digs into Hux's thighs the same way. It doesn't magically make the ache or the swelling in her knees disappear but Hux feels looser, like she might float if she just let go.

She shifts, moving so that she can curl beside Kylo in the water as if they are lying in any more normal place -- the couch, Kylo's bed.

The bathwater does remind Hux of the photosphere. Brilliant, writhing color radiating heat and light just in the softest register of the visible spectrum -- all of the infrared below it and ultraviolet above it hidden from the naked eye but the feel of it still there. The golden shimmer could be a solar flare, starry wind -- the dark, broken petals might be spots, a magnetic flux that refuses movement and exchange.

And there's Kylo in the middle of it all, her gravity as strong as any heavenly body's. Her pull keeps Hux here. In the tub, the house, the arrangement between them. Hux just spins -- in orbit, in axis -- trying to remain stable.

If she ever stops, she doesn't know what will happen. Sudden stops for a planet are catastrophic -- sending everything into the atmosphere at tremendous velocity whether nailed down or not. The atmostphere keeps moving, keeps all those things zooming along until all of the intertia finally flows downhill.

Hux shivers in spite of the warmth of the bath. "You didn't really miss me, that's foolish."

Kylo's hand slips up under Hux's shirt. With the fabric unstuck the warm water rushes up against her skin. The weight of Kylo's hand on Hux's waist is more than just a hand. "I'm a foolish person, you know that."  
  
Hux kisses her for want of any other logical response. She needs to shut Kylo up. Needs to make her stop talking in that voice that's honey and butter and dark wine and the warm bath they're submerged in.

Hux kisses Kylo to shut herself up.

Her tongue feels as loose as her body in the alarming limbo of exhaustion and starvation and uncanny relaxation she's floating in. She's afraid of the things she might be plied into saying.

Kylo draws Hux close with that hand on her waist, presses their bodies together. It's easy to let her do it. Hux settles into it and she's not doing the kissing any longer, she's being kissed.

Hux slips a leg between Kylo's, pants dragging against Kylo's bare skin beneath the surface. It's strange to look at, just in the periphery of Hux's vision -- a dark-light stain beneath the red and the gold. Hux shifts, her boots clonking and squealing on the porcelain, until she has gained the upper hand. On her knees in the stupidly large tub, she hovers dripping over Kylo, watching her.

Kylo is right up against her thigh, tangibly hot even in the bath. Kylo squirms, spreading herself lazily with little twitches of her hips until she is simply openly rubbing her cunt against Hux.

Hux braces herself against the edge of the tub, her body a cage ove Kylo. She lets herself hang, shoulder blades poking out like wings. "Is that all you wanted? To get off? You could have let me sleep first." She shoves her knee closer, pressing back against Kylo's movement.

It's nice, Hux thinks, to perform a function in which she does not have to reach some astronomical expectation. She simply has to be present. The faces Kylo makes are an added bonus, cycling through a wild array of emotions as she twitches.

Kylo arches out of the water for a moment, frozen in place. She's holding back, bringing herself to the edge and stopping for a moment. "Fringe benefits."

"Incorragible."

"What else is new?" She lowers her body again, flicking her hips in shorter strokes. Her arms rise, snaking around Hux's neck -- the deep-sea siren going for the kill.

Hux waits, a spiteful kernel blooming in her gut. Kylo is close, breathing through her nose and her teeth heavily. The bath water is sloshing up against the sides, threatening to spill over again. Hux slides back abruptly, halting Kylo's diligent quest for climax. Clinging as she is, she gasps, surprise when her body slides along the bottom of the tub, because of the sudden loss of an anchor for her hips.

Kylo whines, alarmed, and tries to pull Hux down again. She's heedless of the water that is thrown up over the end of the tub, hitting the floor with a slap. Hux grins and kisses her sweetly. "I'm tired. I'm going to get out of these clothes and go to bed."

Kylo looks shocked as Hux gets out of the tub, climbing awkwardly over the side in her soaked clothes and boots. She nearly breaks herself, the tile floor covered in a spreading pink puddle.

"Enjoy the rest of your bath -- the water's gone a bit cold, I think."

It hasn't, its still tolerable and Hux's voice is as broken as her ass might have been. She almost wants to take it back, to dive back in and let Kylo use her. She doesn't. 

The carpet squelches as Hux steps onto it, the deep shag of the faux sheepskin soaked around the edge closest to the spreading puddle. She steps off and drags the thing away with her foot, sure Kylo will be annoyed if the soft white turns pink. Hux struggles for a moment, her shirt too wet and twisted to easily pull over her head.

"Wait," Kylo says in a breathy warble. "Give me a hand -- I'll help you."

"You're just going to pull me in again, I'm not stupid."

"I won't, I promise." Her voice wavers a little less.

Hux turns, shirt caught awkwardly around her chest. Kylo has slithered up to the side, her cheek resting sweetly on it. Hux sighs and nods. She puts out a hand for Kylo to take but keeps her distance.

It is a terrible idea to watch her rise from the tub -- body glistening and dripping, skin rosy with heat. Hux looks studiously at the floor and Kylo picks up one leg to swing over the tub, sits, then swings the other over.

"Let me help," Kylo croons softly when her feet are on the floor, making the puddle shes standing in quake.

Panic flares through Hux's chest for the briefest of moments, shirt pulled tight around her body, too twisted to really move. She's trapped inside the heavy, sodden fabric for several heartbeats even with Kylo's help.

She gasps for air when she's finally freed, hardly hearing the overly gentle things Kylo is murmuring. Kylo stands close, her bare body touching Hux; her hand against Hux's chest.

"Here," Kylo says, "put your hands here." She brings Hux's hands to her shoulders and lowers herself.

On her knees, Kylo picks at the wet laces of Hux's boots. She hisses and shakes her hand at a bent back nail but finishes the job.

"Up," she commands, smacking the toe of one boot then the other.

Together, they peel Hux out of her wet pants.  
  
Hux stands there shivering in her briefs, hands jammed under her arms while Kylo gets rid of her clothes -- tossing them carelessly into the shower. The clap of the sodden pile of fabric against the tile echoes in the tall glass chamber, reverbrating in Hux's head.

Hux snatches a towel from the shelf to squeeze out her hair and wrap around her body.

"Can I join you?" Kylo asks, almost meek.

"No, I want to actually sleep, sweet." Hux shimmies our of her underwear and gags over her wet socks. She pitches them in the general direction of the shower. "You have a lot of cleaning up to do."

Towel clutched around her body, she steps around the puddle and lays a short peck against Kylo's cheek.

"Fuck," Kylo swears softly as Hux walks away.

Hux dreams.

She dreams vividly in brilliant, blinding colors, but she can't remember the content of it. She can parse it out of she really tries, but she doesn't want to. Shimmering gold and deep copper -- liquid blue-black and impossibly dark berry wine -- pale creamy white -- it's all too telling.

She will let herself believe that she has been imagining how the atmospheres of each of her little pet-planets will look. Not that she can ever hope to really see that, they're much too far away and not in a region of interest to anyone with a camera good enough to take a low-noise image.

She will settle for spectra and determine the chemical content of their bodies, their breath. She'll paint a picture in elemental light. It's all lofty and romantic and it makes her chest hurt.

All of the romance goes up in smoke when she's dragged back to consciousness by a hand kneading her hip and voice calling her name from somewhere in the hazy darkness above the mattress. Hux is bewildered for a moment as she claws her way back to consciousness, unsure of where she is or what time or day it is.

"Go away," she finally grumbles. "I need sleep."

"If you sleep the day away you'll completely fuck yourself. I'm making dinner, get up and come eat."  
  
Hux emerges from the cave of her room swaddled in her thickest jumper and socks. Whatever oils were in that bath water have made her hair a thorough mess. It wasn't the cleanest to begin with and now it's nothing less than tragic.

She's blinded when she steps tentatively out into the hall. It's begun to stay brighter for longer and with the snow outside reflecting the light, it's eye-scorching even at five in the evening. Hux thinks so, at least.

She wants to close all the curtains again, to dip the house back into the gothic-novel shadow it usually occupies. She stops, hands on the curtain in the hall. It's Kylo's house and Kylo opened them.

Hux lets go and steps away. She pads down the stairs and heads straight for the kitchen, following the starchy scent of boiling pasta.

"It's mac and cheese," Kylo says without turning. "They didn't have the little twisties so I got shells. I know you dont like the elbows."

Hux slides into the tall cafe stool at the island and pulls a bowl already set there toward herself. The aroma of balsamic vinegar -- good stuff, thick and dark -- slaps her in the face. She spears a little round of mozzarella and a plump cherry tomato on a fork. It's good, incredibly so after several days of take out and vending machines, impossibly fresh and lovely.

A huge plume of steam fills the kitchen when Kylo drains the pasta over the sink. It feels nice against Hux's cheeks. Warm and wet. She watches Kylo work, stirring tiny pasta shells into cream and butter and powdered cheese mix like a witch over a cauldron.

Kylo fills and oversized dish and slides it across the island for Hux to catch, followed by a tall glass of water that Hux nearly misses.

"I feel like I should put you on a cleanse or something," Kylo says disparagingly.

"Why on earth would you think that? They're bullshit anyway. They do nothing but make you, well..."

Kylo talks with her mouth full, wincing at the too hot pasta she's unceremoniously shoved inside. "Because I'm sure your heart is just pumping high fructose corn syrup and preservatives at this point."  
  
Hux gives her a puzzled look and tucks into the steamy mac and cheese. Its a struggle not to moan when it hits her tongue and the warmth of it pools in her belly.

"Your bag was full of empty Mountain Dew bottles. You know that shit will rot your teeth."  
  
"Why the fuck've you gone through my bag?" Her fork clatters against the marble surface of the island.

"I didn't, calm the hell down. It was open on the floor when I came downstairs. It looked like you just dropped it there. You're lucky you didnt have your laptop on you. I put them in the recycling bin, if that's alright."

Cowed, Hux picks her fork back up.She's a little irritable, she'll admit.

"Why did you bring all that home anyway?"

"I didn't want to leave them on my desk."

"And there's no bin in the whole of the building?"  
  
"I wasn't exactly thinking clearly. I forgot I even took them, to be honest. The morning is a little hazy."

They eat in relatively comfortable silence until Hux feels like she's probably eaten enough mac and cheese for three.

"Mm," Kylo makes a sudden sound as she's licking the big spoon from the pot clean. "There were some papers crunched up in your bag. They looked kind of important. I tried to flatten them -- I think there was still some soda in the one of the bottles. They're in the dining room."  
  
Hux doesn't even remember packing up any of her papers. She recalls locking her notebooks up and setting a password for the folder on the shared server. Her colleagues will be annoyed but it's her project so fuck them.

Dishes in the washer, she goes to investigate. Hux swears a blue streak when she sees a notebook and print-outs she thought she'd left behind.

They're not overly important, but it will be a pain in the ass to deal with if the pages are sticky. The hair drier from the bathroom is on the table too, the notebook's pages carefully seperated with pulled apart paper napkins.

"Is this what you're working on? Why you've been hold up at the observatory for three days?"

"I've only been gone two days, don't be silly."

"You left Monday morning. Today is Thursday."

Hux ignores it, unwilling to acknowledge how much time she's lost track of. She sits down at the table and checks over the pages. They're not too bad. She's glad she doesn't use pencil at all; she'd be screwed then for sure.

"What's the core?" Kylo asks. She leans over the back of Hux's chair and rests her chin on the top of her head. Hux makes a confused grunt in response and Kylo reaches over, tapping one of the many scribbles in the margins of the notebook.

"Not _core_ ," Hux corrects. "Kore."  
  
"Alright then, what's _Kore_?"

"Nothing; nothing important at least. I just... if this is really a thing -- a solar system, not just kind of a trick of depth perception and alignment -- I could, maybe... possibly name it. Since I was the first to make the observation."

"Why Kore?"  
  
Hux shrugs and smoothes the pages in front of her with her hands. They crinkle disappointingly. "Sounds nice, simple. The Kore System. It means _maiden_ in Greek." Hux clears her throat and closes the notebook, leaving all of Kylo's carefully placed napkins inside. "It's a nickname for Persephone. There's already an asteroid called that, so... I considered something refrencing Melinoë as well, but," she loses her train of thought. "What?"

"Why Kore?"

"I don't know, _Kylo_."  
  
"Well it just seems like it's a very specific choice."

"Me, Kylo, I'm Kore. I'm the maiden. A young woman in the middle of a grossly male-dominated field making a tremendous discovery. Me."

"Okay." Kylo is very nonchalant about it. Too much so. "I would have thought you would have made a more direct reference to yourself is all."

"Maybe I was trying to be poetic about it. I've obviously spent too much time with you. I'm getting frivolous." Hux's heart races and she wills the universe to stop Kylo from asking any more questions.

Kylo lifts her chin at last and squeezes Hux's shoulders. "I'll make some tea. Unless you want to go back to bed?"

"No, tea sounds good."

Kylo's hands trail across the back of the chair as she retreats back into the kitchen, leaving Hux alone with her notes.

Hux is glad for Kylo's lush decorating habits when they settle in the living room. She has a chill that she can't seem to shake and the thick, baby alpaca blanket from the back of the couch is heaven-sent. Hux picks at the little metallic threads in the black yarn while Kylo settles the kettle on the coffee table and pours hot water into a pair of mugs. She hands one off to Hux and sinks down onto the other end of the couch. Kylo shoves her chilly feet under the blanket to Hux's chagrin.

They sip quietly and Hux can feel herself drifting again. Her body is heavy and low, like she has just as much gravity as Kylo.

"Why are all the curtains open?" Hux asks, if only to keep herself awake. The sunset has long since faded and the bright winter evening casts the room in a soft silvery glow.

Kylo doesn't answer for a long while. Hux watches her drink her tea, her brow knitted over the top edge of the mug. She's working something out before he speaks, Hux knows.

"The piece I'm working on it..." Kylo bites her lip and sips again. "It's not a happy thing. It's... it's tearing me apart, if I'm honest. And that's why it's the thing that'll connect all my work. It's all my guts on the page. Shiny and wet and raw."

Hux takes a long sip of her tea and tries to put the image out of her head.

"I took like four showers and I still felt like I wasn't clean. I figured, I had to let the light in before I just ripped my damn skin off." Kylo chugs her tea and sets her mug aside. "I think it might actually put me into a psychological tailspin if the Poetry Society passes over me again for this book. There's too much of me in there."

Hux laughs a little roughly and Kylo makes an offended face. "I think for once I know exactly how you feel."

Hux watches with some trepidation as Kylo swings her feet around and crawls up toward Hux's end of the couch. She pushes Hux's chin up with her nose to begin her tender, wet assualt. She starts with the soft bit under Hux's chin and then scrapes her teeth over the tight tendon Hux's neck. Kylo lets out a heavy sigh and buries her face in the collar of Hux's thick jumper.

"I don't know what I'm going to do if I'm wrong about Kore. It's one thing if she's not our twin like I hypothesized. That's the whole point of a hypothesis, it's allowed to be wrong -- or not completely right, at least. But if Kore isn't a system at all? Just... just me overreaching. Fuck!" Hux shudders. "I'll be a laughing stock."

Hux does laugh, bitter and dark like the over-steeped tea in her mug. The weight of Kylo's body on top of her and the lingering warmth of the tea as she finishes it is as alarming as it is comforting. The last thing Hux remembers is placing her empty mug on the floor.

When Hux wakes again the living room is washed in the velvet black of the night that pours in through the bare windows. Her feet are cold and her arm is numb, just as cold as her feet from the pressure of Kylo's weight.

Hux shifts and tries to free herself. She succeeds only in rousing Kylo to lazy consciousness. Her throat is wet again, covered with Kylo's hot mouth moving gently over her pulse.

Kylo sits up just enough to give Hux her arm back. Hovering above, Hux can just about make out the curve of her pale cheek in the weak, cloud-filtered moonlight. "Hux," she asks, voice low and sleep rough. "Do we have a name?"

Hux's heart throbs. Her head spins. Do they? What are they?

"Our solar system, do we have a name? Like Kore will?"

Kylo seems so utterly certain that Hux's little system will hold up in just that odd, sleepy statement. They way _Kore_ rolls from her lips sounds like a prayer. Hux's gut flips.

"No," Hux whispers. "Well, yes, I suppose. The Solar System, capitalized."

"Hux," Kylo whispers back, "that's fucking boring."

**Author's Note:**

> I realized "Kore" was also the name of one of Jupiter's moons after I'd already settled on it so just pretend that moon doesn't exist.
> 
> Also, I know it will bother some people that it seems like I forgot to get Hux's bra off like socks or shoes during sex scenes but she wasn't wearing one! She hardly ever does! Much to Kylo's delight and frustration!


End file.
